


Hate You More

by KMDWriterGrl



Category: The Nanny
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-14
Updated: 2014-08-14
Packaged: 2018-02-13 04:00:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,508
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2136201
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KMDWriterGrl/pseuds/KMDWriterGrl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A prank gone awry gets CC into Niles’ arms … literally! Post-ep for season 2’s “Strike.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hate You More

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kate811](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kate811/gifts).



> This fic was born when I was watching the season 2 episode “Strike” and noticed a fun little bit of stage business. When Niles picked CC up off the floor after making her fall in Max’s office by over polishing the sofa, he felt her up as he picked her up! Look at the YouTube video for the episode from 5:12-5:14 … when Daniel Davis picks Lauren Lane up off the floor, he runs his hand from the top of her ribcage down her hip in a very deliberate caress. It’s probably just a thing the actors did with the assumption that no one would notice (Lauren had taken a pretty ouch-inducing thud onto the floor, after all) but that little bit of business and ALL the subtext was enough to get me thinking that perhaps Niles felt badly enough that he’d let his true feelings for her show, even for just a moment.

Contrary to the opinion of everyone else in the Sheffield household, Niles doesn’t REALLY hate CC Babcock. In fact, he’s rather fond of the woman … more fond lately than he’d care to admit. Despite her futile and rather pathetic crush on Mr. Sheffield, she’s actually not such a bad egg … although getting him to admit that aloud would take an act of torture the likes of which only a Bond villain could devise.

It’s simply that it’s Niles’ role in life to hate CC Babcock … or at least to ACT like he hates her. It’s all part of his niche, just as hers is to be annoyingly haughty, money and power-hungry, and ridiculously sycophantic toward Maxwell Sheffield. And there are several requirements to fulfill that niche … insult CC to her face, insult CC behind her back, insult CC in front of Mr. Sheffield, insult CC in front of Ms. Fine. To a lesser extent, he also feels compelled to play clever practical jokes on CC and, at times, tamper with her food. All part of the game … all part of the job.

He does get the sense that he may have gone too far today, however, considering that he has twice now made her slip and fall. He knows how slippery the hardwood and tiled floors can be … he’s the one who cleans them, after all … and can only guess how hard it must be to walk in heels (expensive, classy business heels VERY unlike Ms. Fine’s extravagant footwear) on a floor so highly polished and slick.

When he hears her fall in the hallway (and sees all of her papers come flying back into the office), he feels a twinge of regret and hurries out with his cleaning supplies. Ms. Fine and Mr. Sheffield are too busy bickering to notice that instead of turning toward the kitchen to put his supplies away, he hurries toward Ms. Babcock instead, who’s sitting on the floor, looking dazed and holding on to her ankle.

Oh dear. He’s actually hurt her. Injuring her has never been a goal … it’s an often hysterical side effect, but certainly never the main reason behind his little pranks and tricks. He’s only after irritating and annoying her … he’s not after maiming her.

“Ms. Babcock, let me help you,” he says, hurrying to her side.

“Oh no, Scrubbing Bubbles,” she replies, jerking away from him. “Forget it. You’ve helped me enough all ready.”

“Would you like Mr. Sheffield to see you like this?” he points out. “Sprawled undignified and graceless on the hall floor?”

She looks up at him and her eyes flash fire. He is very alarmed to notice that there are tears in them too … this is NOT how he’d planned to torment her when he woke up this morning.

“So help me, Butler Boy, if you let him see me this way …”

“Then allow me to help you up.” He extends a hand to her and she takes it, her own hands shaking. He feels even worse about that … CC Babcock may be many things but weak isn’t one of them. She’s tough, cut-throat, and mean as hell … her hands don’t shake for any reason … EVER.

 “I don’t think I can stand on it,” she says doubtfully.

“And what would you like me to do, carry you? Will that fulfill your pathetic dreams of having a man sweep you off your feet?”

“The only sweeping you ever do, Tilex, is the bathroom and kitchen,” she snaps. She makes a valiant effort to stand, he’ll give her credit for that, but sinks back down again with a groan of pain. “Dammit, Niles, if I can’t go to the opening tonight and have to sit alone at home …”

“It’ll be just like any other night on your social calendar.” He kneels next to her, feeling particularly swine-like for having hurt her so badly. “Put your arm around my shoulders.”

“Niles …”

“Snap it up, you hag, I haven’t got all day to haul your miserable carcass around.”

She snaps her mouth shut and does as he’s instructed. He slides one hand under her knees, the other around her waist, his hand latching onto the curve of her hip, and lifts, careful not to lose his own footing and send them crashing to the ground.

She’s much easier to carry than he would have expected—in fact, she’s rather light in spite of her tall frame-- but, because she’ll be expecting some zinger and because it makes him feel a little less guilt-ridden to pretend as though everything’s normal, he says, “All those empty calories in the booze are catching up to you, Babcock.”

She cuffs him on the back of the head, not hard enough to hurt or even enough to shake him, but he pretends to drop her anyway and knows a moment of visceral satisfaction when she clutches at him—not because it pleases him that he’s scared her, but because it feels oddly satisfying to have her fingers deep in the hard muscles of his shoulder.

He carries her into the kitchen and gently sets her down in one of the chairs.

“Let me see it,” he orders.

She laughs, her usual “god, I’m evil and love it” laugh and shakes her head. “Not on your life, Belvedere! Knowing you, you’d snap it off and leave me to bleed to death.”

“Yes, but then I’d have to clean the floors again,” he replies snippily. “Ms. Babcock … CC,” he says. “Until your injury has been properly treated, you have my word that you won’t come to harm at my hands.”

She stares at him, eyes wide and glassy with pain. “You’ve never called me CC before.”

“And I never will again if that’s what you prefer. But I think a truce is in order until we can get you back on your feet.” It’s the genuine remorse he feels for having injured her that makes his voice sincere and that prompts her to believe him. She finally nods and agrees, “Fine. Truce.”

“Good.” He removes her shoe—which undoubtedly costs more than his entire wardrobe—and takes her ankle in his hands to examine it. It’s swelling all right, but isn’t bruising, which is a good sign. “Can you move it?”

She tries, cautiously, and though it makes her hiss through her teeth with pain, she is able to. “I think elevating it with some ice packs ought to take the swelling down,” he says, crossing to the Sub Zero. “Let me get them for you.”

“Where’d you get your M.D. from-- clown college?” she asks, then shakes her head at his look. “Sorry. Reflex. Forget I said anything.”

Niles rolls his eyes but lets it go … he’d be in a testy mood too if he’d slipped and fallen not once but twice. He brings her a stack of tea towels to elevate her ankle and then two gel-filled ice packs wrapped with dish cloths which he applies to both sides of the swollen joint.

“There,” he says, studying his handiwork. “Now just sit there for about 20 minutes and see if that helps.”

CC signs impatiently. “Niles, I don’t HAVE twenty minutes. I have to pick up my dress for this evening.”

“The dry cleaners will deliver. If you don’t take 20 minutes now you aren’t going to make it to the opening later.” Now that they’ve played doctor, he decides it’s time to go back to their original relationship and quips, “Although it’s not as if anyone would miss you.”

Her lip curls up in her usual sneer and she replies, “At least I have a social life, Mr. Clean. Your idea of an opening is taking off the child-safety cap on a new spray bottle of Spic and Span.”

Ah, now they’re back in familiar territory.

“Keep it up, witch, and I’ll make sure you have a VERY nice trip on Mr. Sheffield’s office floor tomorrow.”

She doesn’t speak for awhile—perhaps because he’s put her in her place, more likely because she doesn’t want to waste the energy—and watches him putter around the kitchen, making tea. He wordlessly slides a cup—prepared the way she likes it—across the table to her and sits down with one of his own.

“Thank you,” she replies stiffly.

“Ooh, that must have hurt. Don’t strain yourself too badly there, Babcock.”

“Not for the tea, you blithering idiot. For … back there.”

“Well … it’s only fun if you look like a graceless trollop in front of other people.”

CC sips her tea. “That’s the second time you’ve picked me up today.”

Damn. He was hoping she hadn’t given that much attention to the first. The first had been … well, he certainly damn well hoped it was a fluke.

“You must be particularly clumsy,” he says, trying to sound as blasé as possible. “You might want to have that looked into.”

“Or I might want to chuck that furniture polish out the window,” she shoots back, rolling her eyes. She fixes her gaze on him again. “You made sure I fell off that damn couch but then you picked me up again. Why is that?”

“Well, it’s part of my job … to pick up unwanted filth from the rugs and floors. You certainly fit that description.”

“Takes one to know one, Dirt Devil.” She studies his face with narrowed eyes. “And when you picked me up … I could have sworn that you …” She peers closely at him, trying to assure that she’s got it right. “You felt me up.”

Bloody hell.

“Me? Feel you up? Must have been one of your drunken hallucinations.” He hopes to god she’ll let it go if he insults her enough. Please let her let it go!

“You did,” she insists. “You ran your hand down my waist.”

Bugger. She isn’t going to let it go. Better to play it off … cool and dismissive.

Niles snorts inelegantly. “If you think that’s being felt up, you haven’t experienced that particular phenomenon in a long, LONG time, Babs.”

 “But you DID run your hand down my waist?” she continues, staring at him like a vulture.

“I smoothed out the wrinkles in your jacket,” he replies with as much dignity as he can muster. “If you can call that off-the-rack monstrosity a jacket.”

Sodding damn bloody blasted hell. She noticed it. Why had she noticed THAT of all things?  She’s oblivious to everything else in the world, primarily Mr. Sheffield’s obvious feelings for Ms. Fine … why did she have to pick today to be intuitive?

He HAD felt her up, dammit. And even worse, he’d enjoyed it.

He could have just hauled her to her feet and left her to her own devices but no …

He’d hauled her to her feet …

And steadied her …

And because his hands were there… because he wanted to know what she felt like … because he had started to become more than inordinately fond of her (though he’d rather polish silver for a hundred years than admit that)…

He’d run his hand down her waist. And over her hip. And had REALLY enjoyed what he’d felt.

Under that jacket she had a beautiful figure. He’d seen her in a multitude of evening gowns and clinging blouses, always modest, never as skin-tight as the wardrobe Ms. Fine favored but somehow just as alluring. He knew she was slender, but with just the right curves in all the right places.

Feeling her was an entirely different matter.

Touching her had made the fondness that he’d been so desperately trying to fight back come roaring to life. Not just fondness… attraction too. He was VERY attracted to her. He loved her ash-blonde hair, whether it was pinned up or swinging around her face or tucked behind her ear. He loved the way her hips swiveled in her skirts or, as today, in her body-skimming black pants. He loved her waist and her hips and her breasts and …

Bloody hell. He might actually love her.

No. Sod that. Attraction was one thing … that was chemical. Hormonal. Pheromonal. That was the result of having not nearly enough sex … you go long enough and anything starts to look good!  He doesn’t love Babcock. He couldn’t. He shouldn’t.

But he HAD felt her up. She was right. And he’d done it because he wanted to. Does he dare to admit it to her or try to pass it off with another lame repetition of “brushing the wrinkles from your jacket”?

“Niles?” Her voice is uncertain, which has to be a first for CC Babcock. “What, no witty retort?”

“Sorry, to what?”

“I said my jacket cost more than your entire wardrobe.”

He raises an eyebrow. “All ready figured that out about your shoes.” He sighs. “You want the truth, Babcock?”

“No, Niles, lie to me.” Her tone is laden with sarcasm and for one moment he considers hitting her back with a real zinger.

“I felt you up.”

CC looks so uncertain that he has to grin. Probably no one actually HAS attempted that in a good long while.

“Was that the lie … because I actually wanted to hear …”

“It’s the truth, Imelda, keep up!” He replies, happy to fall back into sarcasm. “Yes, I felt you up. I admit to it. What are you going to do, have me arrested?”

She stares at him as if he’s just burst into a song and dance right there in the kitchen. “Why would you … for god’s sake, Niles, you HATE ME! Why would you feel me up?”

“Because I wanted to know how you felt,” he replies quietly. “I wanted to know what’s underneath those classy and conservative work clothes.”

CC’s still staring at him with disbelief and, worse, distrust in her eyes. “Are you kidding me? Did you miss the part where you hate me? You don’t feel up people you hate!” She looks around the room. “Is this some really elaborate set up? Is Nanny Fine going to come bursting in here with a camcorder so you can send it to Candid Camera? Knowing you, this would help you get your rocks off for a year at least.”

“No set-up,” he replies. “No jokes. Not this time. I wanted to feel you … it’s as simple as that.”

“You can’t …” Her voice trails off. “You HATE me,” she repeats again. “You loathe and despise me. You’d aim a life preserver at my head if I was drowning and hope it would knock me out!”

“There’s a thin line, Babcock,” he says. “I think I may have crossed it some time ago.”

She sputters. “Are you saying all of this …” She waves a hand to encompass him, the kitchen, her ankle … “… this is some elaborate form of foreplay?”

Niles raises an eyebrow. It’s as good an explanation as any.

CC looks as though she’s on uncertain ground. She pushes her hair back from her face and says, “Well … if that’s the case … prove it.”

“Excuse me?” Niles raises an eyebrow. “Prove it?”

“You said you wanted to feel me. Prove it.”

“Right here?” Niles gestures around the kitchen and gives her a leer. “That’s a tad bit inappropriate, don’t you think?”

“You know what you can do, Rochester?” she snaps, starting to rise, momentarily forgetting about her ankle. She stumbles, he lunges for her and, for the third time that day, Niles has her in his arms.

“I’ve got you,” he assures her, holding her hard, waiting for her to find her balance. She grips his upper arms, steadies herself, and lowers herself back into the chair, her face flaming. Her hair is disarrayed and without thinking he brushes it back from her face.

Her gaze flies up to meet his, startled by the sudden show of warmth. Rather than smirk or make a remark about clumsiness, he simply looks back at her, letting a small smile play over his lips. He rather likes her, this arrogantly beautiful blonde, even when she’s heaping abuse on him. When had THAT happened?

“You’re …” CC clears her throat. She’s starting to look slightly panicked. “You’re staring at me.”

“Well,” he says, moving his hand to her cheek a second time, still smiling. “You are quite grotesque.”

The jab goes a long way in reassuring her, although the hand on her cheek is still making her eyes wild … a look that intensifies when his thumb moves up across her cheekbone.

“And you’re … you just completely …” CC searches for words without finding any, which he finds rather satisfying. It isn’t often that he catches her without a good retort on her lips. “Damn you, Niles.”

“You do. Every day.” His hand slides into her hair and her breath catches. “Yet I keep coming back for more.”

“Niles, I can’t think when you--” She blows out a shaky breath. “This had BETTER not be some elaborate prank.”

He doesn’t reply—merely brings his opposite hand up to rest on the base of her throat where her pulse, at this point, is racing and then leans down and kisses her.

She doesn’t push him away. He’d been half expecting her to, frankly, and wants to perform a victory fist pump when she doesn’t … except that one hand is busy cupping the back of her head and the other tracing the lovely warmth of her slender neck, proving that they are much too busy with more important things to do something as immature—and thoroughly American—as a frat-boyish fist pump.

He’s startled when she moans very softly under her breath. It’s just a tiny hint of sound but it’s enough to make him grip her harder and kiss her more deeply.

From her seated position, the most logical place for her hands to land is on his hips. It nearly bowls him over to feel them there … and sends him practically over the moon when she threads her fingers in his belt loop and pulls him closer! Apparently CC Babcock HAS wanted to be kissed … and by someone other than Maxwell Sheffield!

He breaks the kiss before she does, and only because he’s going to lose all semblance of self-control if he continues. He takes half a step back and drops both hands to her collarbone where they trace very gently over her pale skin. She opens her eyes and there’s something that looks suspiciously like longing in them when she asks, “What was that for?”

“I liked what I felt,” he replies, dropping his hands all the way and putting some distance between them.

“And?” she asks, straightening her hair and her jacket and licking her lips.

“And what?” he asks nonchalantly, crossing to the counter to pick up the handset for the cordless telephone.

“And what are you going to do about it?”

“Nothing.”

“NOTHING?!” There’s real rage in her voice … as well as hurt and disappointment. Her eyes crackle and he can practically see a shield rise up around her.

“Would you like for me to go ask Mr. Sheffield for a few hours off so I can ravage his business partner?” Niles asks, raising an eyebrow. “I don’t think that would go over very well, do you?” He pretends to think for a moment. “Perhaps if you were to ask, it would go over better.”

“Oh.” CC deflates, looking chagrined. “Yes, of course, you’re right.” She rolls her eyes. “Ugh, I HATE saying that to you!”

And there they are, back again on home base. Niles grins.

“Perhaps later on, if you aren’t busy howling at the moon, you’ll come back around so we can finish what we started.”

She purses her lips and he can tell she’s trying not to grin.

“A real gentleman would never insult a lady he’d just kissed.”

“I guess you would know, now wouldn’t you?”

She does grin now and nods at the phone. “You push the buttons with the number to make it work, Old English. Who would YOU need to call anyway? It’s not as if you have a social life.”

“The dry cleaners. To deliver your dress.” He turns away and dials, not sure he’s ready to see the look on her face at this small kindness. Once he’s spoken to the dry cleaners and knows that both he and CC have their expressions more or less under control, he turns back around. “It’s on its way. I don’t know why you bother. It’ll probably make you look fat, you know.”

CC laughs; she seems to be enjoying the insults-as-flirtation bit they’ve got going. “It’s not as if that suit makes you look slender and svelte, Chuckles.”

Niles glowers at her, trying fiercely to ignore the grin tugging at the corners of his mouth. “Like anyone asked you, witch.”

“So,” CC says softly. “Later tonight? If I’m not howling at the moon.”

“Later tonight,” he replies, heart lighter than it has been in months. “You know where to find me.”

“In the servant’s quarters.” She sends him a little wink.

“Hate you,” he replies, grinning.

“Hate you more.”

END


End file.
